Today, power is typically generated by a given power-generation source (e.g., a coal-, natural gas-, nuclear-, hydro-, or oil-based power plant, and/or, increasingly, some other renewable energy source, such as wind or solar) and then transmitted and distributed throughout a given geographic region via an electrical grid. Entities that generate, transmit, and/or distribute power may be referred to as utilities, while entities that coordinate, control, and/or monitor electricity transmission throughout the electrical grid may be referred to as electrical-system operators (e.g., a regional transmission organization (RTO) or an independent system operator (ISO)). Grids covering large geographic regions, such as the United States, may consist of a patchwork of utilities and operators.
Individuals increasingly demand inexpensive and more power to support various activities—yet those same individuals, generally, do not desire to have that energy produced near their homes (e.g., by power plants, which may generate, in addition to power, pollution, noise, etc.). To address this problem, utilities and operators attempt to generate and distribute power in a manner that is as efficient and unobtrusive as possible. As a result, advances in efficient approaches to energy management, e.g., efficient approaches to energy generation, transmission, and distribution, are clearly desired.
One recent approach to efficient energy management involves the aggregation of many electrical devices connected to an electrical grid (including those that are relatively small consumers/resources of energy) by an energy aggregator, such that the many electrical devices may be treated as a single, significant entity that is connected to the electrical grid. Thereby, such energy aggregators may enable an electrical-system operator, and other entities associated with the electrical grid more generally, to treat the aggregated electrical devices as a power generation source and/or a storage device. Within this configuration, it may be possible to control the aggregated electrical devices in a unidirectional and/or a bidirectional manner. For instance, in the unidirectional case, the respective power draw of the aggregated electrical devices may be controlled such that those electrical devices are treated as a controllable load. And in the bidirectional case, the energy stored in aggregated electrical devices to be pumped back into the electrical grid.